Haha! You beat me to it.
Brazilian rosewood banned, too
- Thread starter cardit
- Start date
Haha! You beat me to it.
I think this is much to do about nothing. Importing Cuban Cigars has been illegal (trading with the enemy act) since the 60's. Individuals bring in tens of thousands of boxes each year. Yes, a box or two occasionally get snagged by customs but what they're really looking for is the people trying to bring in mass quantities for the purpose of resale. If caught, those guys can get in some pretty big trouble.
I believe the same is going to be true here. Customs has plenty to do without going out to pool halls looking for guys playing pool with cues made of BRW. Were I a cue builder and had a guy trying to sell me several hundred pounds of it, I'd certainly be leery of that. Were I doing a lot of international traveling, I'd think twice about bringing my BRW cue with me although I still doubt that it would be an issue. Customs is looking for weapons, drugs, terrorists, etc.. Common sense tells you that one individual with a BRW cue has to be way, way down their list of priorities.
Were I a Customs Supervisor and saw one of my Inspectors bring a pool cue into the backroom to verify it's ivory and BRW, I would fire him on the spot for being stupid. Ten Terrorists could have just entered the country while that moron was worried about 15 ounces of BRW.
I believe the same is going to be true here. Customs has plenty to do without going out to pool halls looking for guys playing pool with cues made of BRW. Were I a cue builder and had a guy trying to sell me several hundred pounds of it, I'd certainly be leery of that. Were I doing a lot of international traveling, I'd think twice about bringing my BRW cue with me although I still doubt that it would be an issue. Customs is looking for weapons, drugs, terrorists, etc.. Common sense tells you that one individual with a BRW cue has to be way, way down their list of priorities.
Were I a Customs Supervisor and saw one of my Inspectors bring a pool cue into the backroom to verify it's ivory and BRW, I would fire him on the spot for being stupid. Ten Terrorists could have just entered the country while that moron was worried about 15 ounces of BRW.
well this ought to put every South American furniture manufacturer out of business. and 50% of the Chinese & Italian contemporary mfgs who do very high-end laquered exotic veneers. plus many accessory mfgs. let's just ballpark it @ 500 companies.
but good luck enforcing it. i think it's all just for show. i doubt the pool & furniture police will come knocking on our doors to inspect. and even if they do,
- most people don't retain receipts
- the receipts aren't descriptive of materials
- the dealers & wholesalers who sold are out now of business
- knock-offs have become so good nowadays, that those idiots wouldn't know the real thing if it had a sign on it
they tried this approx 15yrs ago, with mahogany & exotic woods & hydes. we had 100 demonstrators, outside the main building during our Furniture Market of 100K people from around the world. while another showroom had brought in some live penguins & built them an arena with a sliding board.
they & their signs were removed promptly. (but we lost the penguins to Animal Rights.) and the mfgs simply stopped "showing" the hydes & only catalogued them.
i can see Customs maybe catching it - but they are understaffed as it is & are more preoccupied with containers from Asia that have noxious fumes. i'd think they'd be on the watch for the Country of Origin. so if it's backdoored (through Canada or Mexico), then....
I think more than anything, the law is a political pacifier for liberal constituents. It would be nearly impossible to enforce, extremely expensive to enforce, not to mention would create an enormous angry backlash if actively & full enforced. As is, it makes environmentalists feel like their lobby dollars made a difference in the world, which earns votes and more lobby money. Maybe i'm wrong & we'll all go to jail or have to pay enormous fines. But I doubt it. The political ramifications of that backlash would be more than the law is worth, IMO.
I'm not sure about that..... I am no environmentalist by any means....the thought of killing elephants for the ivory just to make trinkets is a little hard to swallow....but the same can be said for fur coats, leather goods, and any other trinket made from animal remains.....but then again, none of those are endangered....but the way the leftists skew the numbers, its really hard to know what's real these days when there's an agenda at stake. I'm kinda neutral on the subject, primarily because I am not extremely knowledgeable on it.....but having played with cues made of exotics (brazilian rosewood and ivory) versus a production cue, I couldn't really tell the difference....but I am a mediocre player at best, so what do I know...
What a joke. I'm still gonna buy cues w ivory!!!
I would too....the damage is already done by the time the elephant has been turned into a pool cue. I think it's been illegal to kill elephants solely for their ivory for a long time....but if you poached and got away with it, it was pretty much a "lucky you" scenario.... Didn't we go through this with Mink and coats back in the 70's and 80's?
Kingwood....
Noooooooo !!
:grin-square:
A few sticks....
Mmmmm !!! If you got 1 in 22" like that 17 " piece ,.... I might be interested. :wink:
Well, shit, I better put the legs back on this Brazilian bad boy and paint it white.
Attachments
None of us are proponents of killing elephants so their tusks could be made into trinkets. Here in America we actually have a practical mindset of conservation. Maintain & nurture a resource for continuation of utilization. It's what we do and we are the best in the world at it. We want elephants to survive because it means a controlled market for ivory. Removing us from the governed, legal, commercial trade of ivory will not help elephants. Adversely, it will dump the value of ivory everywhere except in America, which means more tusks will be bought with less money, and more elephants killed to meet demand. At least we were responsible about how we acquired and permitted ivory commerce. Who else gives elephants that courtesy? Further yet, if the ivory is a moot point, then what do we care about the elephants?
Be realistic about this. It doesn't matter what people want to happen, or how they dream of a better planet. Reality happens regardless. Poachers will continue to kill in order to feed their families. The less they get for a tusk, the more elephants they need to kill. It's not rocket science. Ivory has value worldwide and nothing an American politician can do will change that fact. Elephants are screwed, good as extinct.
No.....Pau Ferro (Machaerium scleroxylon) is aka Morado or Bolivian rosewood
http://www.wood-database.com/lumber-identification/hardwoods/pau-ferro/
So, do we have to register the rosewood in our pool tables. Anyone with a Centennial is affected by this law correct? Or, do we need to register if the table is sold across state lines?
Posession is legal. Just don't try to transport or sell it across state lines.
Registering my pool table would be impossible, as I have no idea where the ivory or rosewood came from. Who would?